Musical instrument and method of forming the same



0. J. KENYON July 25, 1950 MUSICAL INSTRUMENT AND METHOD OF FORMING THESAME Filed Dec. 28, 1942 FIG.3.

FIG.4.

FIGZ.

INVENTOR.

OADES J. KENYON maw m WrGM ATTORNEYS Patented July 25 1950 MUSICALINSTRUMENT AND METHOD OF FORMING THE SAME Oades J. Kenyon, SantaBarbara, Calif.

Application December 28, 1942, Serial No. 470,368

1 Claim. 1

The invention relates to musical instruments provided with soundingboards and has more particular reference to stringed instruments Of theviolin type. It is the object of the instrument to improve the tonequality and increase the life of such instruments and to this end theinvention consists in the construction and method as hereinafter setforth.

My invention is based upon a discovery resulting from experimentationcarried on over a considerable period of time. All modern violins havewhat may be called dead spots, that is, portions of the upper and lowerplates that do not vibrate as freely as other portions. I have foundthat continuous and constant overloading of violins for several monthsgreatly helps this difliculty. Breakage from overloading invariablyoccurred at the live spot portions of the upper plate. This indicatedthe stronger and more resistant portions were the dead spots. However,the resistance of the latter portions gradually broke down due to woodfatigue.

I have also discovered that by coating the outer surface of theinstrument with a material exerting an abnormal surface tension thereon,an effect is produced similar to that by overloading. In each instance,the sound quality is improved and the power of the instrument increased.It is, therefore, my conclusion that exterior surface tension is animportant factor in determining the sound quality and life of theinstrument and that by increasing this surface tension, an improvementis obtained.

In carrying out my invention, it is important, first, to select asuitable coating material having the desired characteristics and,second, to apply this coating to the instrument after a pretreatmentthereof which has a shrinkin effect thereon. For the coating materialvarious materials may be used among which are glues and certainsynthetic resins. I prefer the latter as being less influenced byclimatic changes or changes in humidity of the atmosphere. One specificmaterial which I have used is that commercially known as Cascamitepowder which is a urea-formaldehyde resin glue. It is formed as acondensation product by the reaction of urea with formaldehyde in thepresence of a suitable catalyst. This material which is water soluble,when properly dissolved and mixed with coloring material such as brownor orange color Diamond Dyes and with water, produces a varnishappearing coating that has the necessary hardness and tensile strengthand is most satisfactory. The instrument can be coated with thismaterial alone or finish coats of varnish can be applied over the samewith excellent results. The pretreatment consists in placing theinstrument in a dr compartment having a temperature of F. and a1- lowingit to remain therein for several hours. This tends to shrink the woodand while in the shrunken state the coating is applied thereto.

In place of the coating material just described, I may use a watersoluble glue which is applied in the same manner. This operation isrepeated until the desired thickness of glue is obtained after which oneor more coats of varnish may be applied depending upon the color effectdesired. However, as previously stated, the synthetic resin is superiorto the glue in that it is less affected by varying external conditions.

In the accompanying drawings:

Figure 1 illustrates a violin to which my invention is applied;

Figure 2 is a portion of the cross section greatly enlarged illustratingthe coating applied thereto; and

Figures 3, 4 and 5 are diagrammatic views showing the effect of thecoating applied to the surface of a strip.

String instruments of the violin type including the viola, cello andbass viol are all of substantially the same form. This has acharacteristic contour including the rounded upper portion A, the largerrounded lower portion B and the contracted waste portion C. The topplate D is externally convex and the bottom plate (not shown) is ofsimilar form. Figure 2 shows a portion of the top plate which hasparallel convex and concave outer and inner surfaces and with thecoating E applied to the convex surface. This coating is also applied toall portions of the external surface including the sides and bottom.

The effect of the coating is diagrammatically illustrated in Figures 3and 4. The former shows a fiat strip of wood without any coating appliedthereto. Figure 4 shows the same strip having a coating F applied to oneside only with the result that the strip is warped to form a concavesurface.

Figure 5 shows the effect of the coating applied to a convex surface ofa wood strip G and, as indicated in dotted lines at H, the surfacetension will produce a flattening of the strip. In a violin or aninstrument of the same type, the structure is such as to preventdistortion but the coating will, nevertheless, exert a similar surfacetension.

A musical instrument which has been subjected to the treatment as abovedescribed has greatly improved tone quality, as well as longer life.

3 4 What I claim as myinvention is: UNITED STATES PATENTS A soundingboard of a musical instrument of Number Name Date the ViOliIl typehaving a highly t ne laye 2212 Ellis June 23 1942 of glue lying upon,external of and adherin t 121106 Huntley: NO 1371 the outer surface, anda supercoating 0 varnish- 5 373:01 Church No 13 7 1,144,435 Severy June29, 1915 OADES KENYON- 1,876,984 Lindeen Sept. 13, 1932 "Morse Mar. 13,

REFERENCES CITED 10 b'fiiER REFERENCES The following references are ofrecord in the V Davidson: The Violin: Its Construction, pubfile thlsPatent: lished in London by F. Pitman in 1881.

